1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a plasma display panel (PDP) having a dielectric layer that covers display electrodes and a partition that divides a discharge space.
It is desired that a PDP has a panel structure suitable for a display with high luminance and high resolution.
2. Description of the Related Art
A surface discharge type is adopted for an AC type PDP for a color display. According to this surface discharge type, in display discharge for securing luminance, display electrodes to be anodes and cathodes are arranged in parallel on a front or a back substrate, and address electrodes are arranged so as to cross pairs of display electrodes. The surface discharge type PDP needs a partition for localizing discharge in the longitudinal direction of a display electrode (i.e., the row direction). As a simplest partition pattern that has a good productivity, a so-called stripe pattern is known well, in which band-like partitions that are linear in a plan view are arranged at boundaries between columns of a matrix display.
There is an arrangement form of the display electrodes in the surface discharge type, in which the number of rows N plus one of display electrodes are arranged substantially at a constant pitch. In this form, neighboring display electrodes make an electrode pair for surface discharge, and each of the display electrodes except both ends of the arrangement works for an odd row and an even row in a display. This form has an advantage in high definition (reduction of a row pitch) and in effective usage of a display screen.
In the conventional PDP that has display electrodes arranged at a pitch equal to the pitch of the partitions of the stripe pattern, an odd row display and an even row display share one display electrode. Accordingly, a display form is limited to an interlace form. In the interlace form, a half of the total number of rows in a whole screen are not used for a display in each of odd and even fields in such a way that even rows are not lighted in an odd field. Therefore, luminance in the interlace form is lower than that in the progressive form. In addition, since the interlace form causes flickers in a display of a still picture, it is difficult to satisfy the request of a display quality that is necessary for a high quality image device such as a DVD or a full-spec HDTV.
A display of the progressive form can be achieved by adopting a partition having a mesh pattern that divides a discharge space into cells. However, a PDP having a mesh pattern partition has a low productivity of filling a gas in the manufacturing process. Since an inner resistance to ventilation is large, vacuum exhaustion process needs a long time.
In order to reduce the resistance to ventilation, there is a method of cutting off the partition in part. Alternatively, the structure disclosed in Japanese unexamined patent publication No. 2001-216903, in which the dielectric layer is raised in part, has a sufficient ventilation path. However, the method of cutting off the partition or raising the dielectric layer in part causes increase of manufacturing steps and a cost of the product.